Lake Shore
Hosp Authority

Manager Berry: he doesn't want the
public to be informed and
neither does Governor
Scott's handpicked board.

COLUMBIA COUNTY, FL – Governor
Scott's Lake Shore Hospital
Authority is out of compliance
again. While the recent trashing
of the State's Public Records
Law has generally not altered
Authority Manager Berry's
handling of public record
requests, he has most recently
failed to follow the Florida
Statutes to post the Authority's
budget and contrary to the law,
refuses to publish the Authority
meeting agendas to the
Authority's website before its
meetings.

The Budget

According to Florida's Special District Handbook "all
special districts" must comply with the following budget
requirements:

• Must adopt a budget by resolution
each fiscal year

• The total amount available from
taxation and other sources, including balances brought
forward from prior fiscal years, must equal the total of
appropriations for expenditures and reserves

• At a minimum, the adopted budget
must show for each fund, as required by law and sound
financial practices, budgeted revenues and expenditures
by organizational unit that are at least at the level of
detail required for the Annual Financial Report

• The adopted budget must regulate
expenditures of the special district

• An officer of a special district
may not expend or contract for expenditures in any
fiscal year except pursuant to the adopted budget

The tentative budget must be posted on the special
district's official website at least two days before the
budget hearing to consider such budget. The final
adopted budget must be posted on the special district's
official website within 30 days after adoption.

The Lake Shore Hospital
Authority has not posted this year's or last year's
budgets on the Authority website.

Nobody (the DCA) or the Law, Tells the LSHA What To
Do

The Florida statute is clear and specific:

An agenda shall be prepared by the agency in time to
ensure that a copy of the agenda may be received at
least 7 days before the event by any person in the
state who requests a copy and who pays the
reasonable cost of the copy. The agenda, along with
any meeting materials available in electronic form
excluding confidential and exempt information, shall
be published on the agency’s website. The agenda
shall contain the items to be considered in order of
presentation. After the agenda has been made
available, a change shall be made only for good
cause, as determined by the person designated to
preside, and stated in the record. Notification of
such change shall be at the earliest practicable
time.

In the Beginning

In 2007, when the Authority began the discussions
about using the internet to inform folks about the
Authority, posting the agenda was discussed and once the
website was up and rolling the meeting agendas were
posted before the meetings.

Recently

Recently, Authority Manager Berry stopped posting the
meeting agendas and draft minutes until days after the
meetings. This decision was not announced at any public
meeting. However, back room discussions are nothing new
at the Authority or in Columbia County.

The Authority Board is required to be composed of
residents of Columbia County. It is not clear if the
Governor's Board cares about this. One member of the
Board may not reside in the County.

Authority Attorney Fred Koberlein

Seven months ago, shortly after taking over the legal
responsibilities of the Authority from long time
Authority Attorney, Marlin Feagle, Manager Berry
inquired of the new Authority Attorney, Fred Koberlein,
if he was required to post the Authority agendas before
the meetings.

In February, Attorney Koberlein emailed Mr. Berry and
said he wasn't and Mr. Berry doesn't.

In the email Attorney Koberlein commented to Mr.
Berry, "... there has been much speculation that the
legislature will eventually pass specific laws requiring
all public bodies to post materials in advance, due in
large part to the normalcy of websites and technology. I
mention this so that you might consider having your IT
professional look into making the technology available
to your staff in the future."

Epilogue

It appears that Attorney Koberlein needs to revisit his
research.

Additionally, when Mr. Koberlein came on board with
the Authority, the "technology" was available, and had
been for at least the past two decades, with the
Authority availing itself of the available technology
since 2008.